Let’s briefly take stock of the argument we’ve been making so far. In Chapter 2, we saw how humans (and all other species for that matter) are locked in the game of natural selection, which often rewards selfish, competitive behavior. In Chapter 3, we looked at social norms and saw how they constrain our selfish impulses, but also how norms can be fragile and hard to enforce. In Chapter 4, we looked at the many and subtle ways that humans try to cheat by exploiting the fragility of norm enforcement, largely by being discreet about bad behavior. In Chapter 5, we took a closer look at the most
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